Water Fluoridation Status in OECD Nations

Quick Facts:

Of the 34 countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), only 10 have water fluoridation programs.

Four of the 10 OECD countries with water fluoridation programs have less than 15% of their population drinking fluoridated water: South Korea (6%), Spain (11%), and the United Kingdom (11%).

Only 6 OECD countries have more than 50% of their populations drinking fluoridated water: Australia (80%), Chile (70%), the Irish Republic (73%), Israel (70%), New Zealand (61%), and the United States (64%).

Excluding the United States, just 7% of the population in OECD countries consumes artificially fluoridated water.

In total, 369,656,000 people worldwide drink artificially fluoridated water. This represents 5% of the world’s population.

There are more people drinking fluoridated water in the United States than the rest of the world combined.

* List of Countries by Population – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_population
** British Fluoridation Society (2012). One in a Million: The facts about water fluoridation. Available online at: http://www.bfsweb.org/onemillion/onemillion2012.htmlNOTE: The data for “Population Size” is mostly from 2012, whereas the “Number of People with Fluoridated Water” and “Percent with Fluoridated Water” data is based on estimates that the British Fluoridation Society (BFS) appears to have derived between 2009 and 2011. This time difference may explain why some of the BFS’s estimates for “Percent with Fluoridated Water” are incorrect when calculating the population data in this table.